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Learn How To Identify and Manage Invasive Plants In Your Back Yard

April 16, 2023 @ 10:00 am - 12:30 pm

This event is co-sponsored

by Everyone Outside

Join us at the Rockfall Forest in Middlefield, CT, for an Educational Invasive Plant Workshop and Cleanup Party. 

You will learn how to identify and remove some of the more aggressive invasives in our state: garlic mustard, barberry, Asian bittersweet, honeysuckle, privet, autumn olive, Japanese knotweed, multiflora rose, and winged euonymus (burning bush), to name a few.

What to Bring: Bring clippers and gloves if you have them; a limited supply will be available. Tick repellant is suggested.

Bonus: You will have a chance to sample two invasive plant recipes from previously harvested Garlic Mustard. We will provide recipe cards you can bring home. Yes, invasives may be a nuisance, but they can also be tasty!

What are Invasive Plants? 

UCONN’s Invasive Plants Council best describes invasive plants as “non-native plants that are disruptive in a way that causes environmental or economic harm or harm to human health. In minimally managed areas, invasive plants crowd out native plants. The presence of invasive plants alters how plants, animals, soil, and water interact within native ecosystems, often causing harm to other species in addition to the plants that have been crowded out.”

Location: Meet at 9:45 in the Middlefield Memorial School parking lot, 124 Hubbard St, Middlefield, CT. Heavy rain cancels.

Register here: https://forms.gle/fngYEDTVVNUgsepR6

What is Rockfall Forest?

The trails in Rockfall Forest provide an important entry point to Wadsworth Falls State Park, connecting the orange Main Trail from Cherry Hill Road into the Park, and offering the yellow Laurel Grove Brook Trail. The history of these two properties link Colonel Wadsworth’s Legacy and The Rockfall Foundation. From potato farm to wild forest to outdoor classroom, Rockfall Forest has a story to tell.

Colonel Clarence S. Wadsworth founded Rockfall Corporation (now The Rockfall Foundation) in 1935 “to establish, maintain, and care for parks and forest or wild land for the use and enjoyment of the public”. One of the Colonel’s land holdings was a large plot in Middlefield and Rockfall. He entrusted the land to Rockfall Corporation, with a small section known as “The Captain’s Field” retained for use by his son, Seymour Wadsworth.

In 1941, after Colonel Wadsworth’s death, the largest portion of the land, 267 acres known as the “Great Falls Region” was donated by Rockfall Corporation to the Connecticut State Park and Forest commission. The State still maintains this land, the present day Wadsworth Falls State Park. Adjacent Captain’s Field, in the meantime, was leased out by Seymour and used for potato farming in the 1940s and 1950s. After Seymour’s passing, Captain’s Field was transferred to Rockfall Corporation for preservation. To this day, The Rockfall Foundation continues to protect these remaining 16 acres of land, which has reverted to forest since farming was abandoned. No longer a field, The Rockfall Foundation adopted the name Rockfall Forest in 2020.

Details

Date:
April 16, 2023
Time:
10:00 am - 12:30 pm

Venue

Middlefield Memorial School Parking Lot
124 Hubbard St.
Middlefield, CT United States
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